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Kane Biotech, Inc.recently announced the results of an in vivo efficacy study conducted by Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center in Lubbock that demonstrated how their DispersinB wound spray is effective against a biofilm-embedded Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) strain infection.

(AP) — HCA Holdings Inc., the largest hospital chain in the U.S., said Monday that its profit fell 22 percent in the second quarter as its hospitals performed more non-acute procedures and fewer surgeries, hurting its revenue. HCA said its profit declined to $229 million, or 43 cents per share.

A day-old baby has become one of the youngest children in Britain ever to undergo open heart surgery. A very blook and tiny Rudy Maxwell-Jones had open heart surgery at the age of just 36 hours, and is now recovering in Birmingham Children's Hospital. The birth was induced three weeks early because heart failure.

Children who are excluded from discussions about their hospital care often feel scared and angry that no-one is listening to them or telling them what is going on. That's why health professionals and parents need to do more to consult them and include them in decisions, according to research published in the August issue of the Journal of Clinical Nursing .

Linda A. Johnson, AP
The cost of prescription medicines used by millions of people every day is about to plummet. The next 14 months will bring generic versions of seven of the world's 20 best-selling drugs, including cholesterol fighter Lipitor and blood thinner Plavix.
The magnitude of this wave of expiring drugs patents is unprecedented.

In pure numerical terms, anesthesia-associated mortality has risen again. The reasons for this are the disproportionate increase in the numbers of older and multimorbid patients and surgical procedures that would have been unthinkable in the past. This is the result of a selective literature review of André Gottschalk's working group at the Bochum University Hospital in the current issue of Deutsches Ärzteblatt International ( Dtsch Arztebl Int 2011; 108[27]: 469-74).

Two-thirds of people with severe and otherwise untreatable epilepsy were completely cured of their frequent seizures after undergoing neurosurgery at the University of California, San Francisco Medical Center, according to a new study that examined 143 of these patients two years after their operations.

For hundreds of thousands of people, injuring a muscle through an accident like falling off a bike or having surgery can result in a strange and serious complication. Their muscles start growing bones.
No one understood what caused the abnormal bone growth, so there was no treatment. But now, research from Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine and the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania shows that a neuropeptide in the brain called Substance P appears to trigger the formation of the extraskeletal bone.

Infection control researchers investigating a rare bacterial outbreak of Burholderia cepacia complex (Bcc) identified contaminated nasal spray as the root cause of the infections, leading to a national recall of the product. An article in the August issue of Infection Control and Hospital Epidemiology , the journal of the Society for Healthcare Epidemiology of America (SHEA), describes how researchers were able to trace the outbreak back to the nasal decongestant spray.

Obese people with high levels of abdominal fat and liver fat may face increased risks for heart disease and other serious health problems, according to research published in Arteriosclerosis, Thrombosis and Vascular Biology: Journal of the American Heart Association.
Obesity is commonly associated with heart disease risk and problems called cardiometabolic abnormalities, including insulin resistance, type 2 diabetes, cholesterol disorders, hypertension and gout.

The deficit reduction plan floated by the "Gang of Six" senators would include using a Judiciary committee to find an unspecified amount of savings from medical malpractice reform, presumably by limiting settlements. A November 2010 study by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services shows that medical errors contribute significantly to increases in the federal deficit.

(AP) — The nation's largest pediatricians' group has issued its first policy on protecting children from sexual abuse by doctors, citing a recent Delaware case and urging medical facilities to screen employees for previous abuse. Parents and patients also should be informed that they have a right to have a chaperone present during children's exams, according to the policy from the American Academy of Pediatrics.

Tom Murphy, AP
A budding model for primary care that encourages the family doctor to act as a health coach who focuses as much on preventing illness as on treating it has shown promising results and saved insurers millions of dollars. Growth in emergency room visits and hospital admissions slowed and prescription drug costs have been tamed with this approach, known in the industry as patient-centered medical homes, or just medical homes.

An economic study in the current issue of the Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery (JBJS) identifies two cost-effective strategies for hospitals to expedite surgery in hip fracture patients, and potentially improve patient outcomes. "Recent studies suggest that mortality within one year after hip fracture repair increases significantly if the time from hospital admission to surgery exceeds 48 hours and that systems-based factors contribute to delay in surgery," said Christopher J.

A surgeon's behavior in the operating room affects patient outcomes, healthcare costs and medical errors, as well as patient and staff satisfaction, says a commentary in the July issue of Archives of Surgery . The article's primary author is Andrew S. Klein, MD, MBA, a liver surgeon and the director of the Cedars-Sinai Comprehensive Transplant Center in Los Angeles.